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A review by JAMES SOUTHALL

One of the most ambitious television productions of modern times, Taken was a science fiction miniseries executive produced by Steven Spielberg about alien infiltration of earth which was surprisingly intelligent, though not always entirely gripping.  Spielberg's previous miniseries, Band of Brothers, was just as ambitious, and Michael Kamen's score set a high-water mark for modern-day television music; so when Laura Karpman was chosen to score Taken, she had a lot to live up to.  What she wrote was a score of admirable complexity and depthwhich impresses on a number of levels.

The opening title theme is not particularly striking, but is a very pleasant and attractive piece which seems to be a musical expression of human longing for "what's out there".  The three quarters of an hour of music which follows on this album is of an equivalent or higher standard to the majority of music written for theatrical science fiction features in the recent past, which is remarkable given that this is television music, with all the constraints implicit therein.  Most striking is that Karpman has not taken the "easy" route of going for synth meandering for the aliens and sub-Media Ventures action music for the excitement, but has instead written (almost) purely orchestral music which provokes many reactions.

An ingenious track is "Implant Mania", in which dissonant orchestral textures are overlaid by sampled voices to great effect; and this is followed immediately by one of the highlights, "Romans", a piece of particularly muscular action music.  "Artemis" is a piece of wonderful Americana; and the score's quality shines through again in "Mothership Arrival", for which many composers would I'm sure have written some sort of grand, portentous piece, but Karpman instead has written a beautifully introspective, rather moving piece which is, I guess, similar in spirit to John Williams's Close Encounters of the Third Kind (also, of course, written for Steven Spielberg).  "To the Rescue" is a warm and lovely piece of music, moving to a particularly satisfying finale.

The second half of the album, moves on in much the same way, with slices of warm and attractive Americana alternating with powerful action music and sometimes unsettling dissonance.  Particularly striking are the 12 minutes of music which make up the last three tracks, "Mary's Dream", "Allie's Miracle" and "Allie Is Gone", which bring a very satisfying close to the album.  For a project like this, I would expect even one of the major film composers today to verge in the direction of genericism, so for Karpman to have written so personal a score is perhaps her greatest achievement.  Scoring any project of this length brings many unique challenges, but Karpman seems to have thrived on those challenges.  It's a very strong album from a composer whose music I had never previously heard, though I look forward to hearing a lot more from her in future.

Tracks

1. Main Title (1:00)
2. Spaceship (1:41)
3. Artemis (2:37)
4. Implant Mania (2:42)
5. Romans (4:04)
6. Mothership Arrival (2:47)
7. To the Rescue (4:07)
8. Ride (2:28)
9. Tom's Revenge (2:32)
10. Truth Kills Owen (2:38)
11. Allie's Fire (2:14)
12. Lift Off (4:35)
13. Mary's Dream (3:01)
14. Allie's Miracle (3:33)
15. Allie is Gone (4:53)